


Sensing an Enigma

by Anglophile_Rin



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Counting, M/M, Musing, Prompt Fic, Purple, Pyjamas, argument, johnlockchallenges, thunderstorm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-23
Updated: 2012-08-23
Packaged: 2017-11-12 17:08:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/493660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anglophile_Rin/pseuds/Anglophile_Rin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes was not like any other man; that much was obvious to anyone with even a passing acquaintance to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sensing an Enigma

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a response to johnlockchallenges prompt to use any or all of the words:  
> -Argument  
> -Thunderstorm  
> -Purple  
> -Pajamas/pyjamas  
> -Counting
> 
> for a fic, fanart, etc.
> 
> This is what I came up with :)

Sherlock Holmes was not like any other man; that much was obvious to anyone with even a passing acquaintance to him.

He was a genius, an artist, a scientist, and completely, completely mad. Those who didn’t really know him, who didn’t understand him and were maybe even a little afraid of him called him a freak, a weirdo; something alien to this world and all of the rules and laws within it.

John Watson knew Sherlock incredibly well – knew his habits and moods, knew his sock index and filing system of papers under the couch, knew the inside of his mouth and the texture of his curls – and one thing he would agree with was that Sherlock was certainly alien - in all the most fantastic ways - and that he certainly did _not_ follow the rules and laws of this world.

For starters, Sherlock Holmes smelled like a thunderstorm. He smelled like the wind and the kind of heavy rain that soaked you to your bones and stayed in your hair and coat for days. His entire being crackled with the white hot scent of electricity spiking down, crashing to and from the earth. Standing too close to him was dangerous; he was the spot where lightning never struck once but twice, three times, a million times over, and yet John wanted nothing more than to stand with his arms open and his head thrown back, naked to the storm that raged in and around the man and to smell nothing but thunderstorms for the rest of his life.

Sherlock Holmes tasted like the colour purple. Like rich, royal, velvety decadence. His taste went deep into his throat, seeping out from his tongue and into John’s mouth, infecting him with violets and lilacs, tainting his taste buds, making everything else taste grey by comparison. It was a taste as suffocating as dark chocolate, as light as lavender tea, as biting as the bit of plum closest to the centre and as sweetly addictive as ripe, fresh blueberries staining teeth and tongue and fingertips with the words ‘Sherlock Sherlock Sherlock.’

Sherlock Holmes sounded like counting – like a countdown, like a tally, like a check list, like the international language of maths and logic. His words flowed in the steady rhythm of a 4/4 count, transitioning seamlessly into 3/4, 2/4 and even 6/8 without a hitch or a pause or a stutter. Every ‘I love you’ was a tally etched behind John’s eyelids so that every night he could see them lying out in front of him, growing and stretching past his eyes, into his mind’s eye and taking over his cheeks and lips and gums. Every ‘good morning’ was a countdown to the last, so John started the count at infinity and dared him to stop before zero.

Sherlock Holmes felt like pyjamas – soft and warm and shaped just to fit John. He wrapped his legs and arms around John’s torso like a fleece, ran his hands down John’s arms and back like whispering cotton, with a mouth that engulfed him like silk and satin and the wild, burning heat of flannel in August, all at once. John could lounge with Sherlock draped over his chest and lap - less constricting than jeans, more comforting than woolly jumpers - or snuggle into him as he drifted off to sleep, wrapped in ease and warmth and 184 cm of pale elbows and boney feet.

Sherlock Holmes looked like an argument. It wasn’t in his furrowed brow or his tightly thinned lips. It wasn’t in a patronizingly quirked eyebrow or a dismissive wave of the hand.

It was in gangly limbs that moved like they were professionally choreographed. It was in wild, curly hair that was forever unruly yet never out of place. It was in hands too large to be delicate coaxing beauty from a violin and case-breaking details in one go out of a tiny sample on a slide and moving across John’s entire being like he was an idol, a treasure, an atheist’s holy place of undying worship. It was as if Sherlock’s whole body was told once what it should do and how it should behave and went the opposite way, purely for the sake of being argumentative.

And when he was spread out on white sheets (or blue or red or green or pink and purple freaking polka dots) his whole person was fighting and raging and arguing against physics to just be closer, a little closer, always closer.

Sherlock Holmes was unlike any other man. He was an enigma, a marvel, a wonder. He was a countdown and a storm and every shade of purple that white light could ever hope to squeeze out of its spectrum, and then a few more.

He was a dream, a nightmare, a fantasy come down from some alien world, and he had absolutely no intention of ever following any of the rules and laws within this one.


End file.
